"Fat Chic" Reactions

I know it isn't politically correct to even use the word "fat". Just like you can't say that you don't believe in same-sex "marriage" without being called a homophobic or gay hater. Just like you can't say that you are against abortion without being accused of conspiring with the "war on women". People, there was also a time when you didn't dare say cancer out loud. It had to be whispered. Folks didn't talk about it in polite society.

Now it has been suggested that I'm not being a good, humble Catholic because I called the media out on the carpet for glorifying and glamorizing obesity, and that I am "fat shaming". I pointed out that children are helpless victims of the unhealthy and alarmingly growing trend in American society of being grossly overweight. I shamed the media, not fat people. Magazines and runways feature mostly models who are a size 0, but recently a size 22 model has been celebrated, and such examples of portraying obesity as sexy have become more prevalent. Where are the examples of real women with imperfect bodies who are not at either end of the extremes? What we need are models who are of various ages and body types, who are all beautiful in their own, unique ways.

Anorexia is an eating disorder which leads to death. So are the disorders that lead to obesity. As I wrote in "Toxic Accumulation", I am exploring those areas of life in which we tend to have too much. In which we desire to pare down and simplify our lives. In which we want to be more joyful and purposeful in the way we spend our time. Being overweight drags me down. It adds to the pain of my torn spinal disk. It makes it almost impossible to be comfortable in a bra, or without one. My belly fat is the most dangerous kind. As long as you are not underweight and eat a nutritious diet and get adequate exercise, don't smoke, etc., it is always healthier to be slimmer rather than fatter. That's just the truth, dear readers.

I'm not shaming myself or anyone else for the state their bodies are in. But I do want to encourage all of us to treat our bodies well, like the temples of the Holy Spirit that they are. To stop the toxic accumulation of junk food. To learn what real food is, to move our bodies creatively, to take good care of our children, to tell the media that we are tired of the way it makes an idol out of the body.

So to Hades with political correctness. If you are offended by what I wrote, it's because you choose to be. Take a closer look at your reaction. I was writing about me and about the worldly temptation to allow myself to lead a lifestyle that ends in sickness and an early death. I can't be the person God has created me to be if I have no energy to serve him. Being fat weighs us down, in more ways than one. I choose to celebrate life and health. I will not say, "Good for you for proudly being a size 22." I will ask instead, "Is this really how you want to live?" And I will ask, "What can I do to help?" The first thing I can do to help is to get rid of my own toxic accumulation. I will love myself enough to clear my clutter, including the excess inches around my waistline. The bird with it's head stuck in the sand will never fly. I say, let's fly!

The "Fat Chic" Trend

I haven't actually come across this phrase I am using--fat chic. But it's an obvious trend nonetheless. I also think it's a dangerous trend, every bit as harmful as the size 0 standard of high fashion models. I don't envy the flat-chested, hipless, dull eyed girls in the magazines. I have no desire to emulate their emaciated frames. What is tempting to me is the growing glamorization of obesity.

It used to be that a plus size model was about five foot, 10 inches tall and a healthy size 12. I'm an inch and a half shorter than that, and at my age and wearing a size 12, I'm about 7 pounds overweight. I am in fact usually one of the slimmest people I see out in public, even among those significantly younger than me. But do I really want to be in good shape only if compared to most people? I look far better even than some 12-year-old girls. This is not a good thing. This is scary. 

According to www.livestrong.com, "The average height and weight of women varies around the world, but in the United States in 2010 the average adult female height was 63.8 inches -- approximately 5-foot-4 -- and 166.2 pounds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This number is higher than in the past and corresponds to a body mass index that is classified as overweight."

In other words, the average American woman is not simply "pleasantly plump" but is downright fat. And it goes beyond that, with obesity becoming a national crisis. (A BMI of 30 or greater is considered obese, overweight if it’s between 25-29.9, normal if it’s 18.5-24.9, and underweight if it’s less than 18.5.) Not only women suffer from the health risks associated with excess weight, but men too. It's a heart attack waiting to happen. And of special concern to me is childhood obesity. This is a mark of failure in our society.

So why is the media celebrating size 22 models? Why are magazines increasingly featuring extremely overweight bloggers? I am all for loving yourself exactly as you are, because that is the starting point toward better health and overall wellness. But the current spirit of glorifying obesity is deadly. And it is diametrically opposed to the Christian philosophy of the body as a temple of the Holy Spirit.

If I follow in my mother's footsteps, I could be looking at menopause next year. I recently read that after menopause, a woman has to eat 200 some calories less per day just to maintain her current weight. Weight around the middle poses the greatest risk to health, and that is precisely where I gain it. There and in my naturally ample bosom. The "girls" simply cannot get any bigger. I couldn't bear it, either literally or figuratively!

Today is the 31st of August, which is 2 months to Halloween. In the next 8 weeks I could safely lose 2 pounds per week, for a total of 16 shed pounds. That would put me eight pounds below the high end of a healthy weight for my height and age, giving me some wiggle room for that menopausal phase coming in the near future.

It's time to fight the fat chic trend promoted in the media. Do not give in. You will not feel glamorous. You will not be healthy. Your clothes won't fit well, and you may even require breast reduction surgery. You won't be a good role model for your daughters or anyone else. I'm not going to fade quietly into the dark night of gross obesity, no matter how normal or sexy the magazines portray it to be. Are you?

Toxic Accumulation

Let us refer to the period from the 1920s to 1965 as the Golden Age of the modern American housewife. This will save me from repeatedly referring to those specific decades. When you see the words Golden Age from now on, you will know what I mean!

What I have been thinking about today is the multivalent character of toxic accumulation. This is my umbrella term for the various ways in which we have not only too much, but too much of the wrong stuff and not enough of the good things in life. The many ways in which we are over-burdened, over-scheduled, cluttered, and blocked are destroying our health and our serenity. We are a society slowly but surely killing ourselves. And in some mysterious way, it all comes down to honesty.

The phrase "full of poop" comes to mind, more often using an expletive, but I'm trying to be polite. We say someone is full of poop when he is not being honest. Maybe he is outright lying, or exaggerating, or we perceive him to be self-deceived. Now think about being full of poop in the literal sense. What is the cause of constipation?

When my daughter Beezy was a toddler, she was afraid of poop. At age three she was potty trained in terms of peeing in the toilet, but she would only poop in a pull up, and evidently she was holding her poop in. This resulted in a chronic case of constipation, a very painful condition. For over a year we made trips an hour away to a poop specialist, and Beezy had to stay on prescription Miralax. Occasionally she still has recurring bouts of extreme constipation. According to the doctor, such cases of children who are afraid of poop and experience these consequences are not unusual.

So where is the dishonesty in this case? It's hidden in the adult response to potty training. In our hurry up world, parents are pressured by the media and people in their daily lives to make sure that their children do not get "behind" in any way. There is a rush to wean from breastfeeding, to walk, to use the "big girl" potty, to read not only Dick and Jane, but Shakespeare. Children feel the stress of their parents acutely. Due to outside pressure, I told my daughter at one point that she must use the toilet to poop, that I would not put a pull up on her anymore. She went four days without a bowel movement. Worried, I called a nurse, who encouraged me to let her poop in the pull up in order to avoid a trip to the emergency room. I was relieved to have not only a voice of reason supporting me, but an "expert".  I knew no one would argue with the nurse, and I was right.

Ignoring a child's needs and hurrying developmental milestones is dishonest. It is denying the truth of who the child is and what is natural to expect of him. Bucking under outside pressure instead of trusting your motherly instincts and feminine intuition is dishonest. We do not do the thing that we know we should do. When I become constipated, it is because I have been dishonest with myself. I have continued to eat food that is unhealthy, or failed to get adequate exercise. Perhaps I've drunk too much coffee and not enough water. I sometimes ignore my body's signals that I'm becoming ill. When I do make the effort to go to the farmers market, and I increase my intake of fruits and vegetables, what was stuck inside finally gets released. And then I have to admit to myself that I have toxic accumulation that negatively effects the quality of my life.

There are many forms of toxic accumulation, and this is a theme I will continue to explore in the coming week. In the Golden Age of the modern American housewife, I think there was a lesser occurrence of such factors. Contemporary efforts to simplify life are directly tied to eliminating toxic accumulation. So how is your stomach feeling today?  

Women's Work

 Young Housewife by Tyranov

The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and buried in three measures of flour, until all of it was leavened.  Matthew 13: 33


Recently it occurred to me that "women's work" is not a phrase one hears anymore. I remember when growing up that women's work was referred to in a sort of demeaning way--the kind of thing that men should never do, as if it were beneath them. Today's married men often share in traditional women's work, such as changing diapers, doing dishes, preparing meals, and folding laundry. My husband helps with all of these things, except that we no longer have a child in diapers. In many households both parents work, and men share more of the burden of housework than in past generations.

That's a wonderful cultural shift in many ways, but at the same time, I am sensing a tendency in society toward bringing back the dignity of women's work. We are burnt out by the "extreme busyness disorder" of modern life and are sick with the gluttony and idolatry of consumerism. Women have been quietly leaving the trappings of career superwoman behind and coming home to be, once again, the heart of the family. They are reclaiming the traditional domestic arts--tending a kitchen garden, mothering, canning, knitting, baking their own bread...

We see in the Gospel of Matthew a parable told by Jesus, of the kingdom of heaven being like leaven that a woman uses to make her bread expand and rise. Surely a man can also bake bread. But evidently Jesus placed a high value upon this work of the woman in his day.

When I became a member of the Habeeba's belly dance troupe in Columbus, I purchased a costume that had accessories which needed to be finished. I paid another dancer $50.00 to do the bead work. I coveted her skill. I had to have a circle skirt just for practice, the fabric of which cost me $45.00. If I had made the skirt myself, it would have been a disaster. So I sent it, along with the pattern, to my grandmother, and she made the skirt, which had to be cut on the bias, whatever that means. One of the teachers at Habeeba's offered me $100.00 for the skirt! I refused her.

My grandmother is a professional level seamstress who was never paid to sew. As a mother of five, sewing was an indispensable skill to have. I was once a sales associate at the Lazarus department store in Columbus, and every single one of the women who worked in garment alterations was from Russia. American women, by and large, cannot sew. With all of the money I have spent on belly dance costuming, I learned to be in awe of the woman who is a genius with a needle and thread.

I am getting to the point in my daily round where I embrace my humble tasks. As I fold my family's laundry, I am doing the kind of work that women have historically done throughout the ages. And my family drools over my homemade French baguettes! Guiding my child to form good habits is not a waste of time; it is absolutely essential to her future life's happiness. One time my husband told me that when there is not clean underwear in his drawer, he feels like I don't love him. I have never let the underwear drawer be empty since! And isn't it wonderful how easy it really is to keep a man happy?

What the stay-at-home mother does is real work. It isn't lesser work than anything done outside the home for pay. Managing a household takes dedication, intelligence, love, perseverance, organization, creativity, and massive amounts of energy. Not to mention the virtues of patience and humility. Our work encompasses many professions rolled into one. Women who don't possess the skills necessary to do this work well feel the pain.

I remember it being said that women's work is a sacrifice, and the implication was that women shouldn't have to sacrifice anything. The Catholic worldview, on the other hand, is that we carry our crosses with joy. How radical is that?

Do not disdain the woman's work. It is the leaven of the bread that feeds the hungry soul.

The Vintage Catholic Housewife

I have just updated this Organic Mothering blog with a new image of the Madonna and Child, which features the Proverbs 31:18 verse, Her lamp shall not be put out in the night. I have also changed the subtitle to the vintage catholic housewife. In general, a new look is always refreshing. In particular, I have decided to pull together the various themes of this blog and focus in on the time period from the 1920s, up till about 1965.

While no era in history is perfect, there are certain distinguishing features of those decades which I think are desirable and applicable to contemporary life. Might I even say, profoundly inspirational. We can never go back to those bygone days, and in many respects we would not wish to. Yet history exists for us to learn from, does it not? That's what we always heard in school, and that's one area where the truth has been told.

I chose the 1920s as the starting point, because this decade is seen by historians as the beginning of our Modern America. While there is much that is appealing in prior eras, such as in Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie days, the 1920s and forward are accessible in a way that earlier times are not. I closed the timetable with 1965, because that was the last year of the Second Vatican Council, after which the Church was plunged into a confusion and disarray from which she has not fully recovered. It's also before certain radical components of feminism spun into full throttle.

But why on earth, you may be wondering, did I choose to use the word housewife? Well, it works better with the word vintage, for one. And it's kind of fun at this point in Post Modern America to use such an old-fashioned term. Homemaker is truly more lovely and accurate, but if I'm going to get into a certain mindset, I think it's advantageous to use the terms that conjure those retro images in the imagination.

I think that those traditional ways of living and worshiping from 1920s to early 1960s America were much inspired by French Catholics, so do not despair that I am taking leave of la joie de vivre. Far from it. I believe it will all come together most nicely. So welcome to my vintage Catholic housewife bubble!

Charlotte Mason and Deschooling

I had a revelation first thing this morning that explains why I once took a foray into unschooling. I think this was a necessary step on my Charlotte Mason journey. I don't mean to say that it would be necessary for everyone, or that I even recommend it. My best advice is to avoid unschooling altogether. But I understand now the relevant connection in my particular case.

You see, before I became enamored with the idea of unschooling, I was a CM homeschooler. That is, I thought I was. But like many a homeschooler, the public school experience was so ingrained in me that I couldn't really take the high dive plunge into Charlotte Mason; so I just stuck my toes in and maybe waded up to my knees. You know what I mean, don't you? The water is just so cold.

That's a metaphor in more ways than one. The cold stands for all sorts of fear. Breaking out of one's comfort zone and exploring foreign territory takes a great deal of fortitude. No one tells you that you're going to have to be brave. Really and truly brave. For a shot in the arm of confidence and courage, I highly recommend Dr. Seuss' Oh, the Places You'll Go! It's a delight to read aloud, so include your children.

What is also often the case with homeschooling is that you have to swim really hard against the current of societal pressure, the opinions of strangers, and the worries of family and friends. Though it's the fastest growing educational demographic in the U.S., homeschooling is still met with a great deal of suspicion and doubt. It's easy to let this rub off on you and distract you from your purpose and vocation. There's a very good chance that your efforts will be judged entirely upon your child's reading abilities at the age of six, if not before.

The safest bet might seem to be a nicely packaged curriculum that will tell you exactly what to do and will guarantee you "cover" absolutely everything. There's nothing wrong with a boxed curriculum, and it's what works well for many families. But I believe that a Charlotte Mason education presents an even better way, and it's a well-tested remedy for homeschooling burnout. Though it isn't an "easy" way to do things, once you get your routine flowing, it's a very simple method of home-centered learning.

What unschooling got right was the concept of deschooling. Unschooling advocates say that children pulled out of school will need a detoxification period. They will need time to adjust to not being spoon fed and having every minute of the day dictated to them, responding to bells like Pavlov's dog. They might find it very difficult at first to figure out what to do with themselves, to discover their interests and passions. School children's minds are predominantly fed with dry and dumbed down fodder, especially with the new Common Core Curriculum which puts increasing emphasis upon teaching to the test, and which has replaced the bulk of  classic literature traditionally used in schools with "informative texts".

Another result of bringing the children home from school is that the entire family dynamic changes, and the members have to learn to relate in new ways. Children no longer must be separated into grade levels and placed on academic tracks from which it is impossible to break free. Their net worth doesn't have to be measured by performance on tests and the ability to conform. Siblings can learn together, and the integrity of the family unit can be preserved.

I've always been dumb, a bright and talented woman who raised several children once said to me. In school she was placed in the not-so-smart track, and there she has remained, in her mind, all through life. Conversely, the kid always referred to as "gifted" suffers from wondering why he never became rich and famous, why he never measured up to his lofty potential, even with his advanced degrees. Or on the flip side, why he couldn't cut the mustard in college. In all cases, someone else was pulling the strings and gluing on the labels. The emphasis in school is upon what the child doesn't know. With CM, the focus is on what he does know.

Even if you have homeschooled your children from the beginning, and they've never set foot in a school, you still have to deschool yourself. You must re-evaluate the meaning of education. Public schools, by and large, run on a system. Charlotte distinguishes system from method, and her method is an intentional form of self-education. This is how it differs from unschooling. The CM parent directs her child's education. She creates an atmosphere of beauty, learning, and joy in the home and sets down the rails of habit (discipline). She chooses from the best of living books available to provide the food proper to the mind and spirit of the child (a life). So Charlotte Mason's motto goes: Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life. Most importantly, education is the handmaid of Religion.

The only form of education, Charlotte said, is self-education, and this approach is diametrically opposed to the modern, secular humanist system of public schooling. She outlined her method in a set of 20 principles of education, which you can easily google. There is plenty of time in the day to pursue personal interests, as each day's lessons are finished in the morning. But this form of self-education is, unlike unschooling, not interest-led. The child is not responsible for designing her own education. What happens is that when given a diet of living ideas and direct contact with things that his senses can act upon, most notably, ample time spent with Nature, his mind will, on the basis of natural law, extract and work upon the knowledge appropriate to it.

The CM method provides the tools for bringing about this self-education, but the tools alone do not a CM education make. The philosophy behind the method must be understood, and the child's natural curiosity must be engaged. I covered the tip of the CM iceberg by reading other people's writings on Charlotte Mason. Books such as A Charlotte Mason Companion by Karen Andreola are a great place to start. You can read CM blogs and peruse book lists and schedules online at Mater Amabilis, Ambleside Online, and Simply Charlotte Mason. You can join Facebook groups and connect with like-minded mothers. All of these resources are wonderful and can be very beneficial.

However, I caution you to learn from my mistake. I started out reading Charlotte's Mason's Original Homeschooling Series, but I didn't get very far. I made it through to a certain point in Volume 1, and then I only cherry picked it occasionally for ideas. I didn't have the consistent fire of inspiration of her own words or the big picture of her philosophy to guide me, simply because I stopped reading. I was feeling like things were going well with our homeschooling, but I got bored. I wanted more. I lost focus, pulled the anchor, and drifted. And then that golden apple of unschooling winked at me.

But I'm grateful to it. Because I needed to deschool. I still need to deschool, maybe now more than ever, as I go further up and deeper into the Charlotte Mason way of life. I found a wonderful book, The Rosary in Art, from Seton Home Study, and it's perfect for CM art appreciation. They kindly sent me a free catalog, and the temptation became strong to do more of their school-at-home program. Especially since I found their website to be very attractive and user friendly, and they are so profoundly Catholic. And hey, my kid loves workbooks! I settled for their cursive writing book, which will not compromise the CM principles. Because the thing is, you can't have your Charlotte Mason cake and eat it too. But that's another topic for another day.

What I suggest that you do right now is wade straight into Charlotte Mason, but don't go off the high dive, lest you become overwhelmed. Start simply. Read the last in her series, Volume 6, A Philosophy of Education, first. Get one of the companion books, such as Andreola's, and begin to do just a few things. Get a good feel for what constitutes a living book, and read aloud to your children. Start observing nature and spend more time outdoors. Assemble some basic math manipulatives and begin instruction with one-to-one correspondence. Play board games. Listen to classical music as you bake together or do a craft. Begin to understand that children are born persons. Go to Mass as often as you can, and answer your children's questions about God. Do not try to turn everything into a lesson. Once you have finished Vol. 6, go on to Vol. 1.

My mind has been turned back on and my spirit nourished by reading Charlotte Mason's own words. I read with a pencil in my hand! Hers are exactly the sort of living books that she advocated, ones written by a passionate expert in her field. Holy Mother Church and Charlotte Mason are a great combination, and we'll talk more about that too. In the meantime, trust me and let Charlotte's books become your intimate friends.

Kestrel Encounter

Earlier this week Beezy came running to tell me that our outdoor cat, Prince, had wounded a really beautiful bird. "We have to help it!" she exclaimed. The creature was on its back, staring up at us, so I got some thick gloves and turned it over. I was surprised when it turned its head back around to face me, like an owl. Is its neck broken, I wondered? Beezy's cousin was visiting. The girls fetched a basket, and as I tried to transfer the bird to it, he fluttered to a bush and out of sight.

A few minutes later, the girls had the bird in the basket and on the front porch. "I think this is a kestrel," I said, amazed. I only knew this because a friend of ours has been posting pictures on Facebook of kestrels from a tree in his yard. Beezy was gently caring for the bird by using a spray bottle to give it water. The cousins decided to try to feed him wild strawberries, but I realized with a sinking feeling that we wouldn't be able to feed this bird of prey unless we could catch some mice!

I called our vet, who told me to call the police station and get the number for the Department of Natural Resources. The operator got Officer Tom on the line, and before long, he was at our house to pick up the bird, a male kestrel, one of three true falcons. The others are the martin and the peregrine. I had to admire the cat for catching a falcon, but oh dear! Officer Tom was worried that the bird was pretty non-responsive. If he had brain damage, he would have to be put down. The girls had both touched his talons, which evidently was a dangerous thing to do, as these birds are also known as chickenhawks! The talons could have dug in and been extremely difficult to remove, designed as they are by God to grab an entire chicken.

Ironically, I had been worried about not spending enough time out in nature with my child and missing out on learning experiences. And here Nature came knocking right on our door. I heard the song of the kestrel from a video our friend took of the birds at his house and realized that we have more of them living in close proximity to our property. In fact, one just landed on my fence with something in its mouth!

Beezy took some videos yesterday of two of them at the top of our TV antenna, one with what appeared to be a frog. I had been thinking that the birds were especially loud this year, and now I know why! I think Charlotte Mason herself would have been duly impressed with our nature studies. The kestrel, who was named Sarah before we knew he was a boy, was alive as of the day before yesterday, but I did not get a call back after leaving a message with Officer Tom yesterday. So please keep Sarah in your prayers!